


if you're hearing this i see that the sky is still blue

by beyondlogicalclarity



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Companion Piece, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:40:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23586259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beyondlogicalclarity/pseuds/beyondlogicalclarity
Summary: It comes to her in the middle of the night.It isn’t planned. If it were, she would have let herself figure it out a long time ago. It comes to her in a crushing dream.
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor, Samantha "Sam" Arias/Alex Danvers
Comments: 2
Kudos: 69





	1. Lena

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Companion piece to "and the world spins madly on". Please, read that first.
> 
> 2\. Beta'd by oraclewascooler
> 
> 3\. Title from "Sky's Still Blue" by Andrew Belle
> 
> 4\. Quote from "No One's Gonna Love You" by Band of Horses

_It’s looking like a limb torn off, we’re all together just taken apart_.

\----

It comes to her in the middle of the night.

It isn’t planned. If it were, she would have let herself figure it out a long time ago. It comes to her in a crushing dream.

Lena is used to dreams about Kara by now. When you love someone it is easy for them to crawl through reality into dreamland. So, when she started having dreams well over a year ago, it didn’t seem abnormal. Lena had dreamt of Jack Spheer years ago, before anything had even happened between them and she doesn’t think she even ever loved him.

They are at Lena’s place when Kara leans forward with the kiss that’s been waited on by Lena. It’s good, and beautiful, and the most _right_ thing Lena has felt in all her life. Then –

Then Kara is up and jumping out of her window with no hesitation. Lena lunges forward, screaming so loud her lungs feel like they’re going to burst, but when she reaches the window, it’s Supergirl hovering in the sky and the only thing tumbling down is _Lena_.

She wakes up screaming, sweating and crying. Her eyes are wide and everything she’s looked over comes crashing into her mind and exploding her heart.

Kara and “I flew here on a bus." Kara leaving unexpectedly a lot. Kara and the same scar on her forehead as Supergirl. The same eyes. The build. The same fucking smile and long blonde hair. Supergirl appearing in places once held in place with Kara. The damn lockdown at L-Corp with Kara gone and Supergirl surprisingly there. It’s all there, and so much more.

Lena feels sick. Her stomach is turning and her heart is escalating its beating with her heaving breathing. Her body is shaking and it isn’t just from the sobs taking over her body. She’s going to be sick.

The bathroom is too far away, and she vomits halfway there. Her efforts no use here in her home, and out in the world she internally begged to be kinder to her.

Why would Kara _do_ this to her?

Lena swore she was making progress, that being a Luthor was slowly becoming not so important.

Denial is a trickster. It becomes its own lie, and a lie can sometimes become so ingrained into your system that you forget that the denial even exists. It tricks you into thinking however you _need_ to think so the truth doesn’t feel like it’s killing you. The worst part may very well be how it tricks you to open up when the truth knows you shouldn’t.

This is Lena’s downfall.

It had all been so incredibly obvious by Kara’s word slip-ups, but denial stopped Lena from accepting those truths. It bottled them up right alongside Kara’s sudden disappearances and Supergirl’s equally sudden appearances, but it’s the latter that finally triggered her survival instincts to shatter the mirror of denial.

And underneath the broken, jagged pieces had been the truth.

Like she knew it would, the truth is doused in gasoline and set on fire, licking up her legs and tortuously turning her to ash.

\----

Lena is well aware that it is raining. That the time on the clock reads way too late at night, but she does not care. 

Apparently, Kara _doesn’t care_ either. Lena wouldn’t be here, at the moment, if she did.

Her driver holds an umbrella out, but she quickly sends him back in the car as she strides towards the apartment building entrance. Fuck the rain. Let it drown her. She is livid and heartbroken and so confused as to why she truly deserved this. She thought the Luthor name didn’t deserve her, but Supergirl seems to have lied. A true talent the alien has at that.

Her fist curls then pounds heavily on the door relentlessly until a frightened, worried, tired _Supergirl_ answers it. Lena doesn’t even care that water is dripping from her and onto the floor. The moment Lena sees her, red overtakes her vision and she shoves, hard, at the faker’s shoulders.

As expected, Kara lets herself be pushed back and looks on in shock, and it isn’t enough because it isn’t real and Lena shoves and shoves and shoves until Kara finally steadies herself and restrains Lena’s hands.

“Lena, what – “

“You’re a liar!” Lena raises her voice. “You’re a liar and a fake and a traitor. How could you do this to me? How could you let me let you in and then just fuck it all up, Supergirl?”

This time Kara stumbles back all on her own. Her eyes are wide and tears start to build and she opens and closes her mouth. Lena knows what comes next will be lies. They have to be lies, because how could this traitor ever tell the truth?

“Don’t you understand what you’ve done to me? You fucking – ” Lena doesn’t mean to cut herself off here, but the sob that refuses to be left out wrecks her throat. It’s loud and devastated, the sounds of betrayal and lies and stupidity.

It’s sudden, but she leaves then, her legs carrying her away to treat the battered pieces of her heart away from those fucking dumb, intoxicating eyes; leaving Kara to stir in the emotions of the revelation. Flight, fight or freeze. Which one is your instinct?

\----

“Lena, babe, I’m going to need you to calm down, so I can hear what you’re saying.”

Sam’s voice is warm and soothing on the other end of the phone line. Lena takes some deep breaths to do what was asked of her.

“Did you know about Supergirl’s real identity?”

There’s a pause on the end, long and deadly, and giving Lena the exact answer she had been hoping to not receive.

“Yes, I did.” Sam almost whispers over the line, continuing with light pain in her voice, “Only because Reign’s memories became my own. I would have told you, but I couldn’t.”

Sam is another liar lined up in her life, but Lena can’t be mad at her, can’t hate her like she wants to.

If she expected Sam to tell her, she would have been a hypocrite about her view on secrets. It was Sam’s lie, but Kara’s truth and she can’t do much about that.

\----

Lena has spent brutally, irritatingly long days avoiding each call, text and knock she receives from the super team. Locking her balcony doors, so a certain traitor doesn't try to waltz on through. Lena has high intelligence and she knows that wouldn't hold back an upset superhero if said hero really needed her attention, but it's worth a shot.

Intelligence.

A part of her laughs at that, mocks herself, because if she is as intelligent as the IQ test tells her then she wouldn't be in this predicament in the first place.

Maybe she is all the things she didn’t want to become; not good enough – not in intelligence and, certainly, not at heart. If Kara didn’t trust her then maybe the reasons are the cruel ones. Maybe she is just another no good Luthor. The only difference now is that she still wants to change the world.

Stubborn hope is the worst.

\----

Lena does what she needs to do.

She breaks up with James on a rainy day after the clouds have cleared and what was left behind was a wet, puddled up, city. He comes to her place with concerned eyes and frowning brow, all dressy looks with muscular arms. Well, he certainly doesn’t make it easy, but she’s already made up her mind.

He had been blowing up her phone as much as the rest of the inner circle (besides Sam) and she had insistently ignored every single message left. How could she not? The simple thought of Kara Danvers having an inner circle sickens her. They were family. Now they are strangers.

“Lena, I’m so sorry. I know this hurts, but – ”

Lena holds a hand up, cutting him off with a, “You can save it, James. I did not invite you over here for apologies and excuses.”

Except –

How much did James lie? Did he lie? He had confessed about Supergirl using him for intel on her. What has he hid from her during their time together?

Lena internally shakes those thoughts off. It didn’t matter now. He kept Kara’s identity and though she knows he is such a loyal person, she knows his loyalty will always be dedicated the most to the woman who hurt her. She’s already made up her mind. No matter how much she’ll miss him. 

She loves him. Perhaps, not in the way that she should, but she does. No, that honor – the one where her heart truly loves someone - lies with the betrayer.

“Then why am I here? Not that I’m not happy to see you,” James' voice softens with the last bit and he steps closer to her. His face falling when she takes a couple of steps back.

She has to do this now. Just rip it off like a wax strip. Nothing about this entire situation is easy.

He doesn’t cry, and she doesn’t know if that makes it hurt more or less. She never expected James. She had hoped he never expected her either. That his whole role in this wasn’t one of betrayal, hoped of actual feelings.

But, then again, who could truly love her anyway?

Lena lets him kiss her forehead goodbye. It’s not until he leaves that she allows herself to cry two large tears.

One for herself.

One for the victims of betrayal.

\----

Lena receives two phone calls, one voicemail and six messages from Alex asking (demanding) they meet up and talk. Begrudgingly, Lena agrees on one condition. No Kara.

Admittedly, she likes Alex. They weren’t besties of any sort, but the woman had humor and spunk and she went to bat for Ruby while Sam had been dealing with a very much alive Reign. If anything, Lena respects Alex, and, right now, she hated herself for that. Alex is very much a culprit in this as well.

It may seem hypocritical of her to be mad at everyone except Sam, but Lena nursed a bottle of the finest scotch at the thought that Sam didn’t have a say in knowing or not. The super team didn’t let her in. She found out all on her own (thanks, but no thanks, to Reign) and swore herself to secrecy. Perhaps it may be that Sam is the only one on her side.

Anyway, Alex promises no Kara and Lena meets up with her at Alex’s place. Honestly, she thinks she would have denied the request(s) if it weren’t for Sam and her good beliefs in the oldest Danvers.

The woman is, surprisingly, sober. Lena knows that something went on between her and Sam during the road trip, and coming back alone must be hard according to her info. Samantha Arias has very much fallen in love with Alex and Lena can practically see the same pouring from hazel eyes when she talks with Alex.

Alex calls her out for “not my secret to tell" and Lena wants to yell at her for it, because she knows what she said and she doesn’t take that back. It’s just hard thinking she was someone’s best friend and was in the dark the whole goddamn time. Then again, she must not have been a best friend. Why would that be true if everything else wasn’t?

She hates herself for the little lies her denial told herself. She hates herself for opening up. She hates herself for falling hard for liar. She hates herself for it all.

In the end, Lena leaves with the promise to think about talking to Kara again. The bile – that, apparently, doesn’t want to leave her stomach during this entire ordeal – rises up at the thought, and she exits as quickly as she can to settle it back down.

\----

Alex Danvers and her ability to talk to people is a fucking gift, because Lena fucking caves and finds herself talking to her betrayer again.


	2. Kara

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. Short update is short. Next should be longer and coming soon!
> 
> 2\. Quote is a poem by Lang Leav called A Betrayal.
> 
> 3\. I do not own anything.
> 
> 4\. Feel free to kudos and/or review!

_I cannot undo what I have done; I can't un-sing a song that's sung. And the saddest thing about my regret - I can't forgive me and you can't forget._

\----

  
Kara is selfish beneath her heroine pride and trustworthy persona. She knows this about herself. It had been hard to accept, but Lena’s face, crumpled and betrayed, reminded her of it.

There are many things she has done, mistakes made along with her good deeds. Hurting Lena is perhaps her worse mistake, yet. She can claim she didn’t know how to tell her. That she wanted to protect the CEO at all costs, but she realizes there were ways around that. Moments that she could have just blurted it out, and just dealt with the consequences of Lena knowing her secret. Between Lillian and Edge and all the others, she has protected her a lot thus far. She could do it again and again.

When Lena showed up spouting the truth, Kara had been shocked like electricity sparked her heart and she started to curl inwards on herself. It was like the climax of a movie and Lena had shoved and shoved and Kara had actually hoped that a bruise would be left...that it would somehow heal them if she allowed herself to get hurt. It’s sick to her, too, but it was how she felt.  


\----  


Alex is her saving grace. After weeks of being ignored, her sister somehow manages to convince the CEO to see her again...to talk to her again in a hopefully two-sided manner.

They meet at L-Corp. Kara knows Lena feels safe there, but that it’s also a tactician’s move to gain the upper hand. Security will be able to usher her out and – if that fails -- Lena might still have kryptonite nearby. The knowledge of Lena’s kryptonite replica had been hurtful and terrifying and untrustworthy, but Lena never attempted to use it against her before and that counts. Kara knows it counts.

“The secret is out, yet you use the door,” Lena states, her eyes hard, unforgiving and guarded.

It makes Kara’s nerves bounce around, settling sickly in her stomach. There’s no hope of having this conversation on the couch like old times, so she moves a couple of feet from the desk.

“About that time in Juru,” Kara starts, because that’s where the shift between them began (all lies aside), and it feels right to earnestly tell Lena the following. "I shouldn't have used the Luthor name against you. It was wrong. I was wrong, and I am so, so sorry, Lena."

“Tell me, Kara,” Lena is looking at her, swirling a dark liquid around in her glass as she analyzes her stance and words. “What is it about me that isn’t good enough? I mean, I thought I had proved to you that I’m not like my family.”

"Lena, no.” Kara is desperate, it drips out in her voice and she lurches toward the desk.

"It’s not about you being good enough. You are good enough. I just – I – I didn’t know how to tell you. I didn’t know how to protect you if you found out. I am so sorry.”

"Kara supported me. Supergirl doubted me. Which one is it really? Or are we doomed to complexities and heartache? What was real? What was not? Because I've been asking those questions repeatedly to myself and the only answer I receive is a headache and the feeling that we're forever ruined."

If Kara is being honest, it was both. It was supporting and doubting and life is never simple, but Lena deserved more. Lena deserved better. It is a confusing truth to herself.

Though, she hopes they aren’t doomed; that this can be healed and maybe even be better than before. It was real -- the friendship, the looks, the feelings, all of it -- aside from the lies and she knows the chances of Lena believing her are slim. She knows Lena is full of heart shards and self-loathing and doubts and those damn insecurities about being good.

Except for the last part, Kara tells Lena this only to receive a scoff.

"How am I supposed to believe a single word from you?”

“I don’t know. Maybe – Maybe it’s foolish to believe in the hope that I have, but you and I are stronger than this. If you’d just give me another chance – “

Anger building in her eyes, Lena cuts Kara off with, “Do you not remember what I said in the elevator? I don’t continue relationships built on lies and broken trust.”

Kara is losing Lena. It’s felt in the pit of her stomach, and she’s becoming desperate. What is she supposed to say now? The answers are running low. If she loses Lena as a friend, she’ll lose Lena as her love, too.

“I love you,” Kara blurts out, eyes as desperate for closure as Lena herself, “and I know this isn’t the right time to proclaim my truth on that specific topic, and I know I _hurt_ you, and I know that I may not ever be able to forgive myself for lying to you, but I was scared and I _knew_ this was going to happen whether I told you earlier or not. But I – I _love_ you. How can I help you forgive me?”

Her heart is on the line as Lena starts to cry.


	3. Lena

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. Companion piece to "and the world spins madly on". Please, read that first. There's a tiny mention of things from that fic in this one, but it might confuse y'all. Both fics connect. 
> 
> 2\. Beta'd by oraclewascooler
> 
> 3\. Quote from Push by Matchbox Twenty

_She said I don’t know if I’ve ever been good enough, I’m a little bit rusty, and I think my head is caving in. And I don't know if I’ve ever been really loved by a hand that’s touched me, and I feel like something’s going to give. And I’m a little bit angry._

\----

“How can I help you forgive me?”

At this point, Lena is crying as much as Kara and she _hates_ it, because she’s showing true emotions in front of her _again_. Then – then _Kara_ confessing her love to her is just the icing on top of the fucking shitty cake, and what the hell is she supposed to do with _that_? Patiently, Lena had waited and wanted and _hoped_ that this would happen.

They spent so much time together, cried together, had what felt like genuine, _real_ moments together. Kara had been so much more than anyone else in her life for a really long time.… stronger than anything she had felt towards the lovely Jack and even James.

Lena chokes down the rest of her hurt, molds herself back to the Lena _before_ everything. When Lex’s truths first hurt. When people kept looking down upon her. When being a Luthor meant being cold, ruthless, unemotional.

Her shoulders square themselves, jaw locked in an unmovable hold, eyebrows sharp. There is not a trace of emotions in her voice, no cracks, when she says, “That’s the thing, Kara. I don’t think I _can_.”

Kara – _Supergirl_ , Lena thinks with bile rising in her throat – crumbles even more, inching further into herself. There’s desperation and hurt and _concern_ in those intoxicating, blue -- so damn blue -- eyes. Though Lena doesn’t want the concern now and she doesn’t want those eyes looking at her with it in them.

Lena makes a move to open the door and give her an exit. She knows Kara wants to jump and intercept and _beg, beg, beg_ for her to stay. She wants to talk more, get back in Lena’s head and _convince_ her that the rest had been true. She’ll insist that her feelings are real, but Lena won’t let that snake back in to wrap around her brain and constrict it, _squeezing_ any and all sense Lena has ever had.

Kara doesn’t move, though. Not in the way Lena though she would. Kara takes only one step forward while Lena takes strides hastily to the door and opens it.

“By the way,” Lena is at the door, hand tight on the handle, when she ushers Kara to the other side and says coldly, “I really did love you, too.”

Her eyes are locked in a dangerous game with Kara’s, and _there_ it is – the utter heartbreak beyond possible repair twists on Kara’s features, wells up in the now dimmed light of her eyes.

 _Checkmate_ , Lena thinks, and shutting it before Kara can come back in and lie, lie, lie. She swallows the bile in her throat. Except –

Except she didn’t mean it _at all_.

\----

How _dare_ Alex convince her to talk with her sister again. It was a mistake. One where she once again feels her heart being crushed between Kryptonian fingers.

_“I love you.”_

Finally.

Finally, Lena hears what she has yearned for since as long as she can remember.

It leaves a sour taste in her mouth. What the hell? What the _hell_? What the _fucking_ _hell_?

It doesn’t feel right. It feels like another lie wrapped in the lethal hands of a manipulator.

Who could truly fall in love with a Luthor?

James must have been faking it… using her first kiss as a gateway to keep tabs on her.

 _Fuck_ Kara Danvers.

At the moment, Lena does not mean it literally. Once she did. _Of course_ , she did. Kara Danvers is stunning and intelligent and irritatingly _sexy_ , but –

Kara Danvers is also _Supergirl_.

And Supergirl didn’t even have the guts to tell her until it was too late… until Lena _already knew._

It had ripped open the void and sucked Lena right inside, screaming for life and air and that this all had to be some sort of mistake, a joke.

It is a joke. One where Lena is being pranked on and she shivers in embarrassment at the laughs everyone _must_ be having at her.

That lying little –

Lena screams, loud and bold and angry, throwing her glass of brandy at her pristine walls. Lena doesn’t know which one is her – the abused wall, the glass shards or the liquid splattered and dripping.

She does not feel better at her outburst.

What she feels is numb self-loathing.

What a damn fool she is.

\----

The Arias ladies finally come home from their trip, and Lena finds a sliver of glee in the otherwise disastrous time of her life. It takes less than an hour before Lena is invited over to their house to babysit. Sam has other -- more Alex related -- things to attend to. Even if she doesn’t flat out say it, Lena knows enough of their love story by now to know she’s off to “get the girl”.

Lena doesn’t mind watching Ruby for a while. It'll be a well needed and craved distraction between the outing of Supergirl and her pressure of using L-Corp in defiance of her family, for the good of the world outside the tainted Luthor name.

Lena listens to Ruby rant on and on about the road trip, shining with excitement and her child-like way of thinking about the world. Oh, how Lena wishes that the sour taste of reality will skip past the kid. It’s the most devastating thing in the world – reality.

The next thing out of the child’s mouth shocks her.

“You’re the reason Alex left.” Ruby is quick to soothe any hurt from her words with, “It’s okay, though. I know you’re having a hard time.”

Lena hums, swirling her glass of wine as she analyzes the youngster. “How do you suppose you know that?”

“Mom says I’m empathic – tuned in to the energy produced in my company,” Ruby states, eyes scanning over Lena like she just might discover the crack splitting her in two. Lena loves the child, but she gets an uneasy feeling at being watched.

Ruby would have to look more inwards to find what broke her.

“This is about Kara, right?”

“Perhaps.”

“You found out about her cape.”

Great. Lena is so unimportant that a child knew more about her best friend than she did. It’s messed up, and she downs the rest of her wine before pouring another glass.

“Maybe she wanted you to see her for more than her powers.”

Lena pauses, feeling nauseous and her soul naked at how hard those words affect her. It hits home. Lena has been fighting to be seen as Lena rather than another evil Luthor.

\----

For such a young person, Ruby is quite wise. It’s admirable, truly, but Lena hates the way it makes her thoughts speed and spiral. She’s been thinking for hours, long after she left the Arias household.

Could this be the turning point? Is it safe to forgive and try again?

Her phone shines bright and she hovers over the letters, trying to find what to say while another part of her is trying to clear, detangle, her feelings.

She texts Kara:

_Give me more time to think._

Biting her bottom lip, Lena pauses, thinking carefully before adding:

_I’m not promising anything._

Not stopping to reconsider, Lena presses send.


End file.
